[E]very good legal argument is cast in the form of a syllogism.
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Common wisdom has it that legal reasoning proceeds by analogy. this maxim is true in an important way, but it is nevertheless a misleading way to look at legal argument, and is probably responsible for many a poorly crafted and confusing argument.
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The analogies between the case at hand and the cases cited as precedent serve only the secondary function of supporting the premises of th[e] syllogism. thus, the analogy is not the argument; the syllogism is the argument.
James A. Gardner, Legal Argument: The Structure and Lanugage of Effective Advocacy (2d ed. 2007) §§ 1.4-1.5 (emphasis in original).
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[W] hen we are dealing with words that also are a constituent act, like the Constitution of the United States, we must realize that they have called into life a being the development of which could not have been foreseen completely by the most gifted of its begetters. It was enough for them to realize or to hope that they had created an organism; it has taken a century and has cost their successors much sweat and blood to prove that they created a nation. The case before us must be considered in light of our whole experience and not merely in that of what was said a hundred years ago.